


A World Away

by MarieRosabella166



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Bucky Barnes & Sam Wilson Friendship, Bucky Barnes Needs a Hug, Build Your Own Family, Friendship, Infinity Stone Soul World (Marvel), Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Rebuilding, Sad, Sadness, Sam Wilson Needs a Hug, Sam Wilson and James "Bucky" Barnes- bromance, Thanos is a dick, all dusted marvel character to eventually show up
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-08
Updated: 2019-02-17
Packaged: 2019-10-06 05:44:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,908
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17339636
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MarieRosabella166/pseuds/MarieRosabella166
Summary: Peter had joked about welcoming the comfortable nothingness of the void before, but this shit is not what he had in mind.-Or, Peter Parker wakes up in the Soul Stone and befriends all the other dusted Avengers (and friends) as half the world tries to navigate their new lives stuck in the soul world.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> HELLO thank you for clicking on this clusterfuck. We're all depressed that Peter Parker isn't with us to meme his way through the first few months of 2019, so I wrote this shitty kinda fix-it fic to help me cope. And by cope, I mean write indulgent winterspider bonding where everyone feels everything and our dusted faves navigate a tiny part of forever before Tony Stark saves the day and makes us all EVEN MORE DEPRESSED on April 26th
> 
> Please feel free to kudos or comment or report, whichever suits you're fancy.

The first thing Peter knows is the ringing in his ears. A high-pitched shriek of static that reminds him of the subway. It eats away at his brain, consumes his thoughts. It’s the only sound anywhere.

Next, it’s the cough climbing up his throat. The sound of his violent hacking helps to lessen the aggressive ring in his ears but leaves him choking on nothing. His mouth and throat feel like they're full of sawdust; rough, unmovable material suffocating him as he coughs and coughs and coughs. Nothing comes up, none of the pressure relieves.

The erratic beating of his heart follows, the beat echoes throughout his entire being. His Spidey senses maximize the relentless drum, the sound echoing in his head and adding to the roar of his ears till all he can think to do is curl up and scream. But even as he yells at his body to scream, to do _something_ that would distract him from the pain, his throat won’t cooperate. His coughing takes precedence over his need to have some control.

 _Useless_ , Peter thinks as he scrunches his eyes closed and starts to cry. It's too much. He's stuck on Titan, stuck in an endless loop of dying and it's _too much_. He can't escape the feeling of fading as his body turns to dust, bits and pieces of him –of a living, breathing person, he used to be _alive_ just a few moments ago _what is happening_ –crumbling away to nothing.

He can't even feel the heavy press of Mr. Stark's chest against his anymore, he's completely alone. Mr. Stark’s faded away too, and Peter is stuck! He just wants it to be over. Is this his eternity? Is this the curse of Thanos’ snap? Will he spend infinity dying, stuck in his own little hell as he disappears forever?

The oncoming wave of merciless heartbreak is sidetracked by a small burst of irritation, coming from the ever-present itch on the back of his knee –he knows where it is. Even in his current situation he can’t resist the urge to roll his eyes as he reaches down to scratch, already knowing there was no hope. Sweat gathered between his skin and the suit, spandex chafing and irritating his skin. He was so used to the annoyance that followed the familiar tickle. Usually he could ignore it, but after a few hours on rounds that itch felt like fire, burning away at his focus. And it's not like he could do anything about it until he crawled in through his window hours later.

Itch or not, his coughing was still uncontrollable and demanded his full attention. Peter twists himself into a ball, wincing as he tries to force his lungs to play fairly. As soon as he had shifted his weight, though, a dizzying wave of nausea slammed into him.

He, uh… He'd rather not talk about what happens next.

Luckily, he'd had enough sense about him to avoid getting any vomit on the suit. Unfortunately, one look at the ashy grey, acidic-smelling puke was enough to send him hurling his guts up again, adding to the already putrid pile as his body rejected everything that just happened to him.

At least he wasn't turning to dust anymore

When the vomiting subsided, the coughing returned, thankfully weaker and less obstructive than before. He crawled away from his mess as far as he could before doubling over, giving in to the coughing fit until it released him. His throat felt raw, his mouth a disgusting desert that no amount of saliva could chase away.

He laid on the ground, heaving, limbs flown out haphazardly as his heart rate slowly returned to normal, leaving him to deal again with a, now solo, ring in his ears. Eyes still closed in a childish attempt to put off what he knew would be a rude awakening, he rubbed absently at his ear lobe, sometimes bringing the side of his fist against the skin, to try and chase away the buzz.

Who knows how long he laid there, face buried in the crook of his elbow and one hand rubbing at his ear. He was completely defenseless. There could be a million threats creeping towards him as he cried out the rest of his tears and mourned for his loss of life. Peter didn’t know where he was, but he knew he wasn’t with Mr. Stark anymore, the aggressive smell of sulfur that polluted Titan was absent. Thinking about it sent Peter tumbling into his last memory, where he had been embarrassingly clutched to his mentor, whimpering like a fucking kid- god!

Peter buried his face deeper into his skin, wishing he could forget how pathetic he was in that moment. How quickly he had broken down, how he had just abandoned his hero act in favor of begging. How could he be so careless, so immature? Real heroes aren’t afraid of dying.

He returned to patting his ear, preferring the depleting noise of static to the twist in his gut. After a while, the ringing numbed out, till all he was left with was complete silence. He laid there, listening to the regular sound of his heart and steady beat of his pulse, afraid of what may happen (or start happening _again_ ) if he moved. It was only when his left side began to go stiff that he allowed himself to shift his weight, lying on his back with an arm thrown over his eyes. Wherever he was, it was bright. His oversensitive eyes were already dreading the loss of their protection.

“Karen?” He called, groaning at the sore scratch of his voice as he croaked. “What time is it?”

No answer.

“Okay. Okay, yeah, that’s fair. Could you maybe tell me where we are?”

The AI remained silent. Peter cursed in Spanish.

Grumbling a bit, Peter let his arm slide down and fall to his side unceremoniously, prying his eyes open to face a blinding light. Okay –okay, so maybe it wasn’t blinding, but it was way brighter than his computer screen. He blinked rapidly, his hand returning to shade his eyes as he sat up. The light surrounded him, it was all there was to look at. A glowing, yellowish hue that started to turn hazy a couple feet out.

He lowered his hand slowly, face still scrunched up as he forced himself to adjust to his new environment. No matter where Peter looked, all he could see was the light. There wasn’t anything distinguishable around except for himself. His Iron Spider suit (still cool) seemed to be alright, even if Karen was MIA. But, judging from his new surroundings, the service here was probably worse than T-Mobile.

He twisted himself around a few times, trying to spot any shape in the mist that might be a human person. But no luck, all he could see was the yellow haze of wherever the hell he was and the puddle of his puke some odd feet away.

Peter was alone.

* * *

After another round of crying pathetically, Peter decided to be a man… a man who kept his mask on because if he were to run into anyone else –he really hoped he would, god, he was lonely, he wouldn’t want his secret identity to be compromised. Yeah. That was why. Not because someone could see his reddened eyes and maybe _assume_ he had been crying, but because when he got out of this weird, void-like space he wouldn’t want his ugly yearbook photo plastered across all the news stations. This was merely protection.

Besides, he didn’t even know if the air here was safe to breathe. He was being careful. Mr. Stark would be proud.

But anyway, Peter decided to be a man as he picked himself up and began to walk into the light (how poetic). Except all there seemed to be was more and more of this damned, yellow light that never seemed to fade. The smoky horizon just ended up being more of the same glow.

He started to count eventually, keeping track of how long he’d been trekking across the large expanse of absolutely nothing.

Before he even hit one hundred, Peter was groaning with boredom and fidgeting. In a fit of childish annoyance, he flung his left arm out and shot a long stream of web fluid out into the void. He let it fly for a few seconds before releasing the string, holding his breath as he waited for it to hit something, _anything_ , in the sky, but it just fell to the ground limply.

Cutting through the endless glow and landing silently a few yards ahead of him, Peter kicked the ground. “Fuck! Fuck, fuck, _fuck_!” He screamed till his chest was heaving and his breath was heavy. “Fuck,” he huffed out one last time (after realizing he had lost count) before he began walking again, begrudgingly starting back at one.

When he hit 102,937 he halted and screamed his frustration into the void, throwing his fists and kicking at the air as he seethed. His skin itched with the need to kick something or punch or _whatever_. He just wanted to take his anger out on something that couldn’t fight back, wanted to exert enough energy to keep his sadness at bay.

Peter flipped his mask down, hands immediately flying up to drag through his sweaty, mussed locks. He needed a shower –desperately. He’d woken up ridiculously late on the morning of his MoMA field trip that he’d rushed out his window, showing up to his bus half-dressed and with barely a minute to spare. Mr. Harrington hadn’t even looked up when he screamed “here!” from outside the bus, but the Museum of Modern Art was his favourite, and he’d be damned if he had to sacrifice that trip for the art club’s MET visit next month.

Well, now there might not even be a next month.

Whatever though, Peter shook his head, trying to exile the negativity. He could worry about comparing Nauman to White another time, he could bullshit that paper once he got back to earth. Right now, he had bigger problems.

“Karen!” He called, but didn’t even bother to wait for her answer before he started swearing. He’d been trying to connect to her every few hundred steps, but her voice never answered his pleas. Even his meme of an AI was nowhere to be found.

Peter flipped his mask back up, eyes sifting through the master list of controls till he found a clock feature. His heart ached to stop and play around with his new suit, to toy around with the new controls and battle settings. Sure, he’d gotten to try a few out on Titan, but knowing Mr. Stark, there was a shit ton of new tools in his suit.

But it’s not like there was anyone around to teach him about the new suit. Or anything in his new, admittedly shitty, environment to learn on. Who knows if Mr. Stark had even unlocked all the suit’s abilities? He might be stuck with another Training Wheels protocol. Peter sighed and set a stopwatch to run, fixing it to call out ten-minute intervals.

It looked like he’d have to be his own clock.

Without counting to keep his mind focused, Peter pretty much numbed out, only barely registering the call of every ten minutes as he walked on –mask now down. It wasn’t like he was gonna run into anybody anyway.

After three hours of walking and finding absolutely nothing and nobody, Peter grit his teeth and took a running start, releasing a battle cry before launching himself into the ground. Rolling his momentum out against the floor, which felt like sand but was oddly solid to the touch. He would’ve asked Karen to analyze it, ya know, if she was actually here! But no, everything was fine. He was completely alone and rolling around in probably toxic _not_ -sand, but everything was fine!

“Absolutely fine!” he yelled, rubbing the heels of his hands into his eyes. “Absolutely,” Peter slammed his fists down, hard into the ground, “Fucking fine!”

He was exhausted from the lost hope of finding something on his hours of useless exploration. And he was just so _bored_.

Ned and he had joked about welcoming the comfortable nothingness of the void, but this shit was _not_ what Peter had had in mind. This was torture.

Unshed tears burned Peter’s eyes, demanding to pour out after hours of Peter ignoring his feelings of hopelessness.

He hiccupped out a suppressed sob, cursing his wobbling bottom lip as he draped an arm over his eyes, blocking out the relentless light and sheltering his weakness as he let his tears wash down his cheeks.

Peter’s stopwatch called out two intervals of ten before his sobbing subsided. He’d moved to curl in on himself during his tear fest, now lying with his knees pressed against his chest and his head pillowed on a folded arm. His other hand, material of the suit still wet with wiped away tears, lying in a fist before his face.

He was exhausted, even more so than he had been before he lied down. He scrunched his eyes closed, forcing himself to take deep, even breaths as he willed his body to sleep. Begging his mind to shut off, even if he kept getting distracted by inviting dreams of his bed… the couch in Mr. Stark’s lab… his Spanish desk… basically anywhere that was more comfortable than the ground.

It was soft, Peter would admit. Well… softer than it could have been, he’d fallen asleep pressed against harder surfaces before, his problem was more to do with how open it is here. He was completely exposed, there was nothing to hide behind or climb to safety.

He even found himself captivated by the image of a dumpster, which he would have _gladly_ crawled inside of right now. He just needed something to curl up against, anything he could use to feign the idea of safety.

The fifteen-year-old settled into an uneasy doze, squirming and mumbling to himself as he kept his eyes closed, hoping his body would hurry up and catch on sooner or later.

Honestly, he didn’t know how to react to trouble sleeping. Usually his trouble was with falling asleep too easily… and at inappropriate times. Aunt May would argue that the real trouble was his devotion to patrolling every night –but he had responsibilities!

 _Yeah_ , May would respond, _like doing your homework_. But Peter did do his homework! During lunch… if he remembered… or cared.

His halfhearted dreams of sanctuary and May’s singing were interrupted by a sharp kick to his ribs. Peter shouted, not even thinking before he pounced into a fighting stance. Leaping away from his napping place and landing in a crouch with his arms poised to attack, he looked up to face his attacker.

Barely hiding his surprise –his mask was down! _Shitshitfuck_ –as he saw a man before him, eyes narrowed but lips set in a lazy, amused smirk. The guy had a messy head of long, straight brown hair that fell into his eyes. He looked battle worn, a trail of dried blood leaking from an open cut above his brow.

Peter could probably take him.

The boy assessed his opponent, taking in the man’s wide set shoulders… Shoulder, _what the fuck this guy has a metal arm_. Wait, Peter’s mind was fucking running as he realized that _holy shit this guy has a metal arm. I_ know _this guy!_

“Hey!” He felt an idiotic smile stretch across his lips, tension rolling out of his body as he recognized the first person, he’d seen in what felt like weeks. “I know you!” _Oh, wow, good one, Pete_. His smile flickered, he really was an idiot.

But the Winter Soldier smirked, meeting Peter’s gaze easily. “Hey kid, fancy seeing you here.”

“Wait-” Holy shit, Bucky Barnes remembered him. Peter has his comic books under his bed _jesus fucking christ._ If anyone asked, he was totally not fangirling right now. “You remember me?”

James smirked, “Sure. I’d know that ugly suit anywhere.”

“Oh my god, this is a –hey!”

He snorted. “You’re that kid from Berlin, with the sticky stuff.”

“Web fluid,” Peter mumbled, but he wasn’t petty. “You’re the guy with the metal arm, the one that tried to kill me, if my memory serves correctly.” He really wasn’t petty.

“Hey, hey, no. Sam’s the one that kicked your ass. I just watched.”

"Yeah," Peter scoffed. "Well, thanks.”

The super soldier shifted a little on his feet, an act that looked awkward paired with his tight, military posture. Peter flitted his gaze away briefly, the easy tension of the unlikely conversation fading as the two remembered where they were.

“You here alone, kid?”

Peter flinched at the abruptness of the question, looking anywhere but into the inquisitive –and likely pitying, stare of the Winter Soldier. “Yeah…Yeah, uh, it’s.” He took a deep breath, afraid to look down at his hand in fear that they’d be shaking. “It’s just me. You’re the first person I’ve seen.”

“Likewise,” Barnes nodded. “I thought you were dead at first, y’know? Was gonna make a wide circle, maybe see what you had in your pockets –don’t look at me like that, kid! I’m starving!” Peter actually found himself laughing at that. “Then your little getup caught my eye and I decided to-”

“To scare the shit outta me?” Peter interrupted.

The soldier laughed (and Peter 100% did not get an odd sense of victory when Bucky Barnes smiled at him. Absolutely not.) “Exactly,” the soldier’s smile was back. That made things a little easier.

“You know, your second impression isn’t going a whole lot better than your first.”

“Kid, I don’t give a rats ass what you think of me.”

“The feelings mutual.” It wasn’t. Peter would give his left arm to be friends with the Winter Soldier.

The Soldier rolled his eyes at him, but his smile remained (small victories, Peter reminded himself). It already felt like a huge weight had been lifted off of his chest, and just because he was _talking_ to somebody.

“Well, if you ain’t dead,” the soldier waved him up. “C’mon kid, let’s go.”

“What?” Peter scrambled to stand on his feet, trying to brush off his clumsiness as best as he could.

Barnes raised a brow at him, “let’s go figure this shit out together. Unless, you’d rather trek across this shit-hole alone?”

“No! I mean, no, no, thanks. Yeah. Yeah, lets, um, let’s walk together. That’s cool.”

The Winter Soldier stared at him for a beat before snorting again and taking a few steps forward, not even looking back to see if Peter was following him –which he very much was.

“This is nice,” Peter rambled, a small part of him intimated by the idea of going back to silence. “We’re like partners in crime, two dudes roaming the void and looking for a way out. We’re, like, like a team.”

“Yeah, well, it’s not like I could’ve left Stark’s kid alone wearing _that_. You’re lucky I found you before someone else did and decided to beat you up for wearing freaking spandex.”

“Listen, you gotta stop cracking jokes about my suit. Besides, you have no reason to talk; what the hell are you even wearing? What even _are_ those pants, man? They’re like –woah! You have a gun!?”

“Oh, yeah,” Barnes looked over his shoulder with an amused grin. “No bullets though.”

“…bummer.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please enjoy Emily's Geographical Commentary and Peter's blabbering Inner Monologue

Walking with Bucky Barnes was nice. In an awkward kinda way.

The two didn’t really have anything in common other than impending doom and “hey! My best friend hate’s your best friend!”, so conversation was a little strained. Peter didn’t really know if he was allowed to cross the “we tried to kill each other in Berlin” line but figured it was better if he didn’t remind the famed Winter Soldier that he had webbed him to the floor of an airport.

“Where ya from?” Bucky asked eventually.

“Queens,” Peter answered proudly, eyes narrowing when Bucky made a face. “What? You think Brooklyn’s better?”

“I _know_ Brooklyn’s better,” Bucky countered.

Peter scoffed, “Listen, Mr. Barnes, I know you’re older than dirt and all, but today’s Brooklyn is dirty. And there’s a lotta fights,” Peter added pointedly; he spent a decent amount of time pursuing crime in Brighton.

“That’s why Brooklyn is better! You have a nice riot and then you shake hands and grab some funnel cake. What’re ya gonna do in Queens? Stand in a too long line to grab a cup of shitty coffee on your way to Manhattan? Please, kid, c’mon.”

Being that Peter went to school in Midtown, he couldn’t really argue. “At least neither of us are from Staten Island.”

Bucky laughed loudly, “fuck Staten Island!”

“Fuck Staten island!” Peter repeated, glad to see that some things never changed.

“Also, call me Bucky. I might be ‘older than dirt’,” he elbowed Peter playfully in the side, “but I ain’t a mister.”

Peter’s lips twitched into a lopsided grin, “whatever you say, Sargent Barnes.”

Bucky eye roll was so exaggerated that Peter couldn’t help but be reminded of Tony. “Watch it, spiderling. I’ve still gotta kick your ass for sticking me to that airport.”

“You flew me _out of a glass ceiling_.”

“ _Sam_ did! It’s always Sam who beats up on little kids –not me! It feeds his ego.”

“Are you gonna blame everything on someone who isn’t even here?”

“I’d do it if he was here, too. He’s a dick, I’m a dick. If I have the opportunity to say he beats up on children in spandex, then I’m gonna take it.”

The conversation was a good distraction from their surroundings. They’d been walking for a little more than an hour, according to his suit, and there still wasn’t anything. Peter had hoped that after Bucky finding them, there would be more people around. Hoped that he had walked enough before to finally get in the thick of everyone else who was banished here, but so far, no luck.

“You know, I’m getting real tired of the color yellow,” Peter confessed.

Bucky’s laugh was quiet, forced. “Something tells me that we’re gonna have to get used to it.”

Peter, to his terror, almost said “oof.” Out loud. To the Winter Soldier. The man who has, objectively, had the biggest oof of a life ever.

They were a bit more sullen after that. But they both made keeping up the conversation a priority. Even if it felt like they were on a bad date as they scrambled for things to talk about. Peter was usually great at talking, exceptional, really. Yet he couldn’t find the right rhythm, there was hardly any common ground that wouldn’t depress the two of them, so they were forced to do _small talk_. Like they were rich people or Canadians.

Bucky had asked him about his grades. Which, of course, Peter had been happy to discuss. Casually dropping that he was in the running for valedictorian, which is, you know, _no big deal or anything, I don’t even care_. The look Bucky shot him after said that the man knew he cared, probably too much, and that he definitely knows about that onetime Peter cried over his chemistry homework.

To their delight, the geography started changing. It was still yellow, sure, but the once flat plane was starting to dip and rise around them. No gigantic mountains or anything, but the few hints of a valley was enough to perk up Peter’s mood a little.

_Just_ a little though. Because these lifts were not working in their favor. As a count, by tentative hour 17, not counting Bucky or Peter, the pair had seen seven other bodies. All of which has seen Peter and Bucky first and promptly ran away.

When one had screamed as they disappeared over a hill, Peter sent a sidelong glance at the gun slung over Bucky’s shoulder. The soldier, catching his gaze, huffed and started the pull at the strap.

“No! Keep it,” Peter protested. Bucky raised a brow. “I’d rather we have it than someone else. And everyone’s still scared, you know? I’m sure we’ll have better luck when we aren’t all preoccupied with turning back into dust.”

Bucky’s eyes grew softer, his hand falling from the strap of his gun. _Oh god. The Winter Soldier is pitying me. I’ll never live this down._ “I don’t think you gotta worry about that happening again, spidey. I gotta feeling we’re gonna be stuck here for a while.”

“Yeah,” _oHmYgOd PETER stop sounding like a kicked puppy_. “Yeah, I know. But it’s not that easy to forget. We haven’t been here a full day yet, so I’m just wondering if we’re gonna reset or not and if we do then, then what if we get separated again an–"

“Woah! Woah, Pete, okay, calm down. You’re not allowed to spiral out on me, okay?” Bucky put a hand on his shoulder and _oh no, more pity, fuck_. “It’s gonna be okay, right? Unfortunately for you, your sorry ass is stuck with me.” He waited for Peter to return his smile, weak as it was, before putting him on the shoulder and then hiking his gun strap back into place before walking again.

Peter followed, wishing he had something to do with his hands.

“Wait, how’d you know we’ve been here less than a day? You gotta clock or somethin’?”

“Hm? Oh! Yeah, well, it’s more like a timer, I started it a bit after I woke up. It’s been almost 18 hours.”

“Huh.”

“What?”

“Nothin’, nothing. It just feels longer.”

“I know what you mean. It’s unsatisfying, to know we’ve been here for such little time but to still feel like it’s been an eternity. Not to mention that we’ve barely seen anything but each other for six hours.”

He hummed, looking ahead. “Give me a head’s up when we hit 20 hours, then we can stop, rest if we haven’t found anything interesting my then. You sure you don’t have any food on you?”

“Bucky, no offense, but even if I did, I wouldn’t tell you.”

He laughed and mumbled something under his breath and _okay, seriously? Peter was going to work on that. It kills half their conversations._

Their path led them down into a valley, arguably the biggest one they’d come across as of yet. The sides of the hills dwarfing the two as they walked across the middle. Both of them were on edge, the tension surrounding them was palpable, Peter barely resisted the urge to pop his mask up. But while they were perfectly visible, so was everyone else.

“Bucky, look!” Peter whispered, pointing towards the height of the valley, a bit to the left was a blurb of a human, sitting with their back to Peter and Bucky. “There's someone up there.”

It was nice to see someone who wasn't sprinting away from them or lying prone.

“Oh, yeah,” Bucky’s eyes were trained on the oblivious person. “Yeah, finally!” Bucky sounded delighted, “let’s circle 'em, alright? They've got their back to us, gosh, this is brilliant!”

“Bucky, you're getting a little ahead of yourself.”

“You still got that sticky stuff, right, kid? Use it. Take him from the left, I'll run at 'em from the right, scare 'em right into your arms.”

“Mr. Barnes, I really don’t think that’s necessary,” Peter mumbled.

Bucky’s fingers were twitching towards the strap of his gun, like he was debating whether or not he should use it as a sort of battering ram. The look he shot Peter was one of confusion, “how do you mean?”

“Cause- because we probably can’t die,” _again_ , “and this is a closed environment! What’re we gonna do once we got him, huh?”

“They could be dangerous,” Bucky insisted, the both of them hissing back and forth.

“ _We_ are dangerous. We’re, like, avengers, man. We shouldn’t make a habit of snea-”

“Ay, ay! Watch it! I am not in that boy band, a’ight? Stevie would have my head if I started gallivanting around with the lot a’ ya.”

Peter blinked. He did not _gallivant_. “Yeah. Sure, okay, but let’s not forget you’re a super soldier.”

Bucky grunted.

“You’re a super soldier. I’m Spiderman. We are not ethically entitled to the right of stalking some poor, lost person who’s already scared half-to-death!”

Bucky stared at him in silence, annoyance radiating off of him. After a moment, he sighed, long and filled with oh-woe-is-me suffering. “I dunno _why_ I always seem to get stuck with one of you goddamn moral-fucking-do-gooders!” Bucky had forgone whispering by now, “But it’s getting really old!” His words weren’t even directed at Peter, he was speaking with his head tilted up to the sky.

“... yeah, that’s rough buddy.”

“So, Mr. Manners, what would you suggest we do instead?”

“Well. I mean, it’s 2018. So instead of jumping people, we typically say ‘hi.’”

Bucky mumbled his distaste, something about how the future was boring and then a lot of swear words revolving around ‘Steve.’

“Alright,” he adjusted the strap of his gun. “Let’s go introduce ourselves to the potentially dangerous stranger.”

The walk up the hill was a bit more tense than Peter would have liked. Clearly, Bucky still had some things to work through. He’d been pretty wary of all the other dozen people they’d passed, but Peter guessed this was a bit different. No one had ever been at a point of weakness with them. They had only really seen the running backs of strangers. All of which were probably frightened by Bucky’s gun, but Peter didn’t want to bring up ditching the machine gun just yet. He also didn’t really want to forgo the weapon, bullets or not, it added to their street cred.

Bucky was obviously nervous, his gaze was hard and trained on the stranger’s back, any movement, no matter how small, catalogued by the soldier. Some parts of the scene reminded Peter of the Howling Commando’s comics, especially the shift in personality. The sniper had always been cited as over-protective, except while Captain America may have resented Bucky’s all-business attitude, Peter was oddly comforted by it.

Without Karen, he felt a bit exposed. Even if his Spidey senses seemed to be cooperating, he still felt foggy. There were parts of his senses that weren’t working as well as they should. His body was still out of whack, which, he guessed was understandable, given that he was literal dust 19 hours ago.

Peter was getting ready to shout out a greeting when the stranger –Peter figured it was a guy, said something.

“You guys know how space works, right?” The person called without turning around. “You two understand how sound moves? I sure hope you do, I really hope you knew that this whole valley deal acts like an amphitheater and that I could hear every single word you were saying. You guys knew that, right?”

They both froze, a good ten feet from the laughing stranger. Peter sputtered, Bucky scowled.

The man turned around, red tinted goggles hiding his face, “because it really seemed like you guys _wanted_ me to—” His words cut out as soon as his eyes focused on the approaching party. “Oh, you’ve gotta be kidding me! Barnes? What the fuck man?!”

And then Bucky was swearing like _crazy_. Peter was a little bit impressed. Bucky seemed to be in the middle of a self-deprecating, hate speech to god. “Wilson! Just my fucking luck.”

“Did you not recognize me? Seriously?" His goggles slid upon to rest on his forehead. "I knew you were a dumbass, but damn.”

“Sorry, but you’re get-up’s a little unremarkable.”

“Aw, I missed you too, Bucky-bear. I spent an entire year trying to forget you and your shitty haircut.”

“Was the pain too much for you, birdy? Were you really so lost without me?”

“Oh yeah, I sure do miss the good ol’ days. Running around the world, trying to stop some baseball cap wearing psycho and talking your dumbass friend off a ledge every time he saw a brunette.”

“That time in Italy was nice! I bought you a drink.”

“Man, _you stole my wallet!_ ”

Bucky pointed his finger directly in Sam’s face, “And I’d do it again, punk.”

Okay, so, in all fairness, this was not the polite interaction Peter had originally planned to force Bucky to comply to. Usually, when he was patrolling, he didn’t insult people before aiding them or admit any of his previous offenses. But this was better than it could have gone. Sorta.

“I will drop your ass, you ugly ass mother –wait! You’re that bug kid!”

_Holy fuck he’s talking to me_. Peter made a truly charming babble of what may have been vowels, but other than that he simply started to sweat under the Falcon’s glare.

“Hey!" Bucky saved him, "Don’t talk to the kid like that! You’re the one that pretends to be a pigeon.”

“What? Are you his babysitter now?”

“Nah! We’re a team!”

“Yeah!” The childish outburst was (mostly) against Peter’s will, but he had to say _something_ eventually.

The Falcon shot him another suspicious glare, before lifting his hand up.

To Peter’s absolute amazement, Bucky immediately reached down and pulled him up while saying, “he’s a much better partner than you ever were. Even if he talks too much.”

“Oh? As opposed to you who doesn’t talk at all! At least the bug baby doesn’t wear eyeliner.”

“I’m an arachnid!” Now both men were staring at Peter incredulously. Way to go Peter, “spiders are not bug’s. They are arachnids.”

Sam smirked, “I could still crush you under my shoe. Not a big difference.”

“You weren’t so smug when the kid had you glued to the floor,” Bucky taunted him, thankfully stealing Sam’s attention away from Peter.

“Ya now, snowflake, I actually think I missed your bitch ass.”

“The feeling is not mutual.” Bucky declared, winking at Peter.

_Oh my god_ , the teen thought. _Did I do it? Am I cool? ARE ME AND THE WINTER SOLDIER COOL? Is this an alliance!?_

Wilson laughed, the booming sound filled with mirth and one of the loudest thing’s Peter had heard since waking up. He opened his arms and embraced Bucky, hugging the man loosely and not in a strictly ‘bro’ way. Peter had to keep himself from gaping when Bucky returned the gesture, patting the man on the back before shoving him away with a smile.

“I actually am glad to see your ugly ass,” Sam confessed. “I was losing my mind in here, haven’t really seen anyone else since I woke up.”

“Yeah, well, you’re always welcome to join our party.” Bucky told him, before a heavy, metal arm landed on Peter’s shoulders. “That is, if Peter’s okay with it.”

Both men turned to see Peter’s response. “Oh, oh, yeah!” Peter cleared his throat, trying to shrug without looking like an idiot, “yeah, cool, it’s whatever. You can tag along. I guess.”

Bucky snorted, the Falcon seemed bemused –but no longer hostile.

“Alright, with the _arachnid’s_ blessing,” he stuck a hand out, “I’m Sam Wilson.”

Peter gripped Sam’s hand, maybe using a bit more strength than necessary as the two shook hands. “Peter Parker.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> YO this is late and I'm sorry and yeah, maybe I should write my chapter's ahead of time but I'm a dumbass college student so I'm just glad this is happening 
> 
> Thank you so much to whoever commented and left kudos! Ya'll are blessed wOw


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